336 HETEROMERA. 
many others exist in collections. I have to enumerate nine species from Central 
America. P. nigro-punctatus (and P. pictus, Guér.) very closely resembles Cuphotes 
elongata, C. maculosa (Thoms.), &c., and except for the laterally margined thorax 
would seem better included in that genus; our other species have a very different 
facies. Pacilesthus, however, like Strongylium, contains a very heterogeneous assem- 
blage of species, comparatively few of which inhabit our region, and will doubtless 
have eventually to be subdivided; all the species here referred to it have the sides of 
the thorax completely margined. In P. nigro-punctatus the under surface is slightly 
pubescent ; and, as in some species of Cuphotes, the middle of the metasternum, the 
underside of the femora, and the last ventral segment are somewhat thickly clothed 
with hair in the male; in our other species the under surface in both sexes is 
almost entirely glabrous. The anterior tibie are often strongly curved and sinuous 
and clothed with short hair within in the male; usually slightly curved in the 
female. 
1. Pecilesthus nigro-punctatus. (Tab. XIV. fig. 8, 3.) 
Spheniscus nigropunctatus, Chevy. in litt.; Gemm. & Har. Cat. vii. p. 2028". 
Spheniscus irroratus, Reiche in litt. 
Oblong ovate, moderately convex, black, shining. Head closely and finely punctured, the intraocular space 
and the vertex much more sparingly so, shallowly longitudinally impressed between the eyes; antenne 
short, slightly passing the base of the prothorax, much widened outwardly, joint 3 much longer than 4, 
joints 5-7 subtriangular, scarcely differing in length, each much wider than its predecessor, 8-11 broad, 
wider than 7, transverse, 9 and 10 very strongly so, entirely black; prothorax strongly transverse, 
moderately convex, the base feebly sinuate, the apex shallowly arcuate-emarginate, the sides feebly but 
distinctly margined, narrowing rather rapidly from the base, nearly straight, a little rounded in front, the 
anterior angles rounded and slightly produced, the hind angles subacute, the basal fovez very deep, the 
disc slightly impressed in the middle before the base, the surface very finely and sparingly punctured ; 
scutellum triangular, black; elytra rather long, moderately convex, the sides nearly straight in their basal 
half, widest a little behind the middle, the shoulders scarcely impressed within, light yellowish-testaceous, 
with numerous irregularly scattered rounded or oblong black or bluish-black spots, the base (narrowly) 
and the apex (usually) more or less marked with black, the spots each surrounded by a line of punctures 
and the interspaces with tortuous lines of rather coarse impressions, the rest of the surface closely and 
minutely punctured, the extreme base only with longitudinal rows of impressions; beneath (and the 
epipleure) black, slightly pubescent, sparingly punctured, the ventral surface more closely so; the meta- 
sternum in the middle and the under surface of the femora thickly clothed with short hair, and the last 
two ventral segments with longer and darker hair, in the male, the sixth (or hidden) ventral segment very 
deeply excised in the middle in this sex; legs comparatively short and stout, black, the anterior and 
intermediate tibie longer and more curved in the male. 
Length 11-17 millim.; breadth 5-8 millim. (¢ 9.) 
Hab. *Mzuxico? (coll. F. Bates); Panama (coll. F. Bates), Bugaba, Volcan de Chiriqui 
(Champion).—CoLOMBIA; VENEZUELA; BRaziL. 
Var. a. The sides of the prothorax broadly, and the basal half of the femora, red; the elytra marked as in 
the type. 
Hab. VENEZUELA (coll. F. Bates). One example. 
